Only a few days till the Presidential elections of 2008, and we’re still being bombarded by negative ads. Have you seen Obama’s 30-minute infomercial on 3 major networks this past week? I haven’t… no time for that sh*t… too busy making a list of all the things I’ll be buying with the welfare tax check that I’ll be receiving when Obama comes into power. Too bad we don’t have a whole bunch of Oprah’s out there… I’d really like a big cut of her check. Unfortunately we’ll have to “spread that wealth around” among 95% of middle class Americans including the 40% of those who do not pay any taxes at all. What a bummer!

On a lighter note, I was amused to find this in my inbox today. See the picture above? Why do they think Democrats are such socialists? What’s wrong with “spreading the wealth around”? What’s wrong with taking from the rich and giving to the poor? What’s wrong with taking money from those who work hard to build a financial future for themselves? After all, isn’t this their patriotic duty to “give to the cause”, to hand out money or spread the wealth to those who are less motivated than they are? I’m glad the celebrities are for Obama. I guess they realize, despite being pinheads most of the time, that we do need change. I’m glad they realize that with all the money they make, it’s their patriotic duty to share some of this wealth to the rest of us 95 percenters who watch their shows, buy their CDs, go to their concerts, promote their music or products without compensation. I really admire them. You’d think after Obama takes office and redistributes the wealth of those who make more than $250K a year (or is it $200K now?, or didn’t Biden say $150K… can’t they make up their minds?) that they wouldn’t want that to happen and that they’d want to keep all their money. Ironically, those people who make more than $250K a year actually contributed to Obama’s cause. How patriotic! We need more rich people in this world, don’t you agree? Hey, don’t you want to be rich, making more than $250K a year so you can help Obama “spread the wealth around”? Wouldn’t you like like to make more than $250K so you can support your fellow Americans who’d like to stay in the middle class, or want to stay poor for that matter? Wouldn’t that be patriotic?

And what about this “Tito the Builder” guy who’s been defending “Joe the Plumber”? What does he know? He had the audacity to go on Fox New’s Hannity & Colmes talking about the socialism that Obama plans to implement here in America. He had the audacity to say that Democrats like Obama would give the “poor” people “crumbs” to keep them happy so that they wouldn’t question the government like “Joe the Plumber” did, or that these “poor” people getting redistributed money from the government would want to stay where they are and not strive hard to better themselves which is true anyway. Shame on you “Tito the Builder” for comparing Obama’s political or economic policies to that of Hugo Chavez, the pinhead president of Venezuela, or that of Fidel Castro’s socialist Cuba. You better watch out “Tito the Builder”… you’re about to be scrutinized by dirt diggin’ agents of the Democratic party just like “Joe the Plumber” has been investigated on regarding his alleged back taxes, or whether he paid child support, etc. My golly, he’s not even a licensed plumber! “Tito the Builder”, you’ve better have your credentials in check before the Obama camp find the skeletons in your closet because you’ll be subject to these scrutiny and intimidation tactic investigations to silence your sorry a** just like socialist governments do to silence private citizens who criticize them. Hey, don’t forget that the media is not on your side… it’s on Obama’s side… so you better know which side you need to be on “Tito the Builder”, because after November 4… your freedom and rights will no longer exist to the full extend you think it should be. Hey, just think about it man… a Democratic supermajority liberal government under Obama… and like him, you’d better know how to dance to the beat of someone else’s drum.

Obama says, “we need change!”… I hope he didn’t mean pocket change. But then again, with the current state of the economy and the new tax plans he promises to implement as soon as he gets into office, you’d better have enough change in your pocket. Martha Stewart knows this for sure. She’s going to be redistributing her wealth to the 95% of middle class Americans when the Obama government takes a portion of her earnings to give it to the “poor”, and like the good citizen she is, she knows its her “patriotic duty” to do so, so she says she’ll just have to “suck it up”. I just hope she doesn’t cut jobs or lay people off when this happens. We need more Martha’s in this world… don’t you want to be one? 🙂

“Guilt by association!”… That’s the latest Barrack attack by the McCain camp on his association with Bill Ayers. Bill who? We’ve never heard of him until the final momemts of the campaign. You’ve gotta love politics… at the last moment all the skeletons come out of the closet, especially when the other party is trailing the polls and is clearly losing the race. McCain indeed is screwed. Americans are smarter than that.

Who cares about Bill Ayers? He’s only labeled a domestic terrorist who planted bombs during his active radical years. He’s only the guy that the media claims was “unrepentant” and that he wished that they had done more bombings. He’s only the guy that happened to be in the neighborhood with Barrack when Barrack worked for him to distribute money to “radicalize” the educational system… all allegations by the way. Hey, as far as anybody is concerned, Barracks associations don’t mean a damn thing… he can be cousins with Osama bin Laden and we still will vote him into the oval office because, gosh darn it, associations do not matter to the American people. What matters the most right now is the economy… as they put it, “it’s the economy STUPIDS!”. Right now if Osama himself would claim that he’s got the answer to our economic and energy crisis, people would vote for him. Who cares? Bill Ayers my a**! And this latest fiasco “Joe the Plumber”. Joe who?

Hey people, leave “Joe the Plumber” alone. He only asked Obama about his economic plan, and it’s clear we’re headed for socialism. Yup, that’s the change we desperately need! Hey, we have nothing to fear but fear itself, right? Finally, we the middle class will get our share of welfare. After all, we’ve been contributing to it for many years now, it’s payback time! Say yes to taxing them big earners that make more than $250,000 like senators and celebrities. Say yes to taxing them big businesses and oil companies like Exxon Mobil who will eventually increase retail prices to make up for the “loss” due to higher taxes rates. We wouldn’t feel it anyway because of Barracks tax cuts and wealth redistribution scheme for us, the middle class. For once in our lives, we the 95% of the people, need to receive something we did not earn. I like this, Barrack’s my Robin Hood, as in, my Robin ‘N D Hud!

Acorn? What are you nuts? Leave them alone! Darn people just wanna make a livin’. C’mon ya’ll, without Acorn them grass roots and favorite Disney characters like Mickey Mouse wouldn’t have a voice… they wouldn’t be registered to vote. Thanks to Acorn “elitist” banks allowed us to get mortgages we can’t afford to help us live the American dream. Who cares about voter registration fraud? It’s the economy STUPIDS! That’s what matters, and I think Obama’s “The One!”.

So, America, listen up! If you’re really smart, vote for Obama! It’s about time we have welfare for the middle class. It’s about time we get something for nothing. And it’s about time we forget about terrorist because… IT’S THE ECONOMY STUPIDS! GOOOOOOO BAMAHHHH!

I’m fired up! A new tide is rising that will give us access to “quality” healthcare. It’s about time… or is it?

Have you seen the last presidential debate? Interesting. But then again, we don’t call politics “politics” for nothing. In my opinion the term means, “tell them what they want to hear at the moment”, and for the most part, the “middle class” wants to hear the words, “tax cut”, and “wealth redistribution”. Hey, that really motivates me to stay in the middle class and not try to better myself so I stay with the rest of the 95% of the population that’s going to get a tax cut… I’m entitled to something, right? Even if I don’t contribute to the rest of society, I should get something in return. Who needs a hand up when we can all get a hand out? Hey, I know how hard life is so I work hard to earn so I can feed myself and my family. That reminds me of a bumper sticker I saw one day which I’m sure you’ve seen before. It said, “Work hard: People on welfare depend on you!”.

If there was one thing that mattered to me in the last presidential debate it’s the topic of healthcare. This subject hits close to home for two reasons… one, I’m at the forefront of its delivery, you know, being a nurse and all, and two, I need it for me and my family. If I remember it right (correct me if I’m wrong), Sen Obama said that if you were an employee with employer based healthcare insurance, nothing changes except for the fact that he will help you get it at a lower premium rate. However, if you were someone that did not have healthcare insurance, then you can buy into the same healthcare insurance pool that Federal employees like himself enjoy. Of course, he said, that you’ll be able to get it at a lower rate because there will be a great pool of people who would buy into it. Well, if that was the case, wouldn’t it be safe to say that this will be the end of employer based healthcare insurance?

I think it would be safe to reason that if healthcare insurance administered by the Federal government would provide an individual or family with better quality healthcare than the ones we get from our employer, then I’m sure many of us would give up our employer based healthcare insurance for one offered by the government. If this were the case, what would be the potential implications of this?

Well, for one, health insurance companies may lose a lot of business or eventually go out of business, or better yet, be competitive and match government based healthcare insurance in terms of coverage or services provided. Two, many more uninsured will be able to get healthcare insurance which would be great since it would make healthcare insurance more affordable, but then again doesn’t Medicaid cover those who are uninsured? Yet, another implication would be that eventually these services may buckle up since people with preexisting conditions would be able to qualify for coverage and begin using these services possibly to the point of exhausting these resources. Overall, I don’t think this kind of government based insurnace coverage would make a difference… just look at the mess we have with Medicare and Medicaid and you’ll know what I mean.

Overall I hope Obama wins this election. He’ll turn our country into a socialist society, not that socialism is wrong, right? Just think about it… you don’t have to work hard to get ahead. You can do a mediocre job earning mediocre pay, and the government will fill in the rest by “spreading the wealth around”. Now you don’t have to dream big or try to achieve more, or pursue personal development since your ability to create wealth will now be your liability. We can now expect celebrities to pay us royalties… after all, we the fans are the ones that make them rich… and unlike most of us, they earn more than $250,000 a year and therefore part of that income should be redistributed to us, the middle class. Can’t wait to get my redistribution check from money earned by Oprah, Justin Timberlake, and Ellen DeGeneres… can’t wait to get low cost healthcare insurance… yup, I think Obama is right… it’s about time we had our wealth “redistributed”. Is it fair? You decide! 🙂

In an effort to cut cost, our hospital has decided that the best way to accomplish this is to increase patient load and decrease support personel. For example, the current nurse-patient ratio in our ICU is 2 to 1. It will now be increase 3 to 1, and when the census hits a certain “low” point, CNAs and ward clerks would have to be cancelled. I guess having a “level 3 trauma” designation doesn’t matter. So much for meeting the national “patient safety” goal and “service excellence” the hospital champions so much which I think is a bunch of sticky BULL SHIT! You know, the kind of BULL SHIT that stinks so bad you can smell it a mile away… the kind that sticks to your clothing your only recourse is to burn your clothes when you get home because no matter how much laundry you use, the stank ain’t comin’ off.

I’m not sure how our managers come up with these “cost cutting” measures but I think they are forgetting those who matter the most… our patients. If you want to know how well a hospital takes care of their patients, all you need to do is ask a nurse that works there the following question: “Would you want to be admitted here if you got sick?”. If they answer “yes”, then you know you’ve found quality health care. Unfortunately I cannot say the same for MMC. The attitude that prevails here is the “I just work here” attitude. I think this is the kind of poison that plagues our healthcare industry today. There is no such thing as nursing as a calling. Like everything else, corporate America has reduced nursing to a “job”. Hey, I’ll just “do my job” and everything will be OK, right? After all, nursing is a “recession proof” profession… I’ll always be “in demand” regardless of my attitude, right? It’s a good thing that the job description doesn’t include clauses that require us to have a cheerful disposition, a “positive outlook”, or a “do it with a friendly smile” demeanor. You can’t force a person into being customer friendly if they don’t have it in them… and you sure can’t foster a customer friendly attitude if you’re going to cut cost by decreasing support or increasing the work load on your “front line” soldiers.

I wonder if this could be one of the reasons we are facing a nursing shortage crisis of epic proportions. According to the AACN, the nursing shortage could reach as high as 500,000 by 2025 (AACN, 2008). Part of the problem is attributed to the low rate of enrollment for new nurses as well as a shortage of nursing faculty which restrict nursing program enrollments. There is an aging nursing population with an average age of current RNs in their mid 40s. I think this number is steadily on the rise, given the fact that with all the stress that comes with the job, the average nurse ages three times more than the average person. On top of this, there is a fast turn over and a large number of nurses leaving the job. And like our dependence on foreign oil, we too are dependent on foreign nurses to meet the demands we are facing today.

Before the recent Wall Street bailout, the healthcare industry has already been experiencing a bailout of its own. Unfortunately this bailout is not in the form of money given by the government to rescue failing companies, but rather, the steady decrease in nursing personnel brought about mostly by unreasonable demands created in the workplace. The notion that nursing is a tough profession and that it takes a special kind of person to be a nurse may be true to some degree, however, nurses aren’t immune to fatigue and burn out, not to mention boredom. I think the healthcare industry need to be more heavily regulated in terms of what should be expected in the workplace. For example, standardize nurse patient ratios and fine hospitals who do not adhere to the guidelines, increase salaries for bedside nurses and mandate acuity based staffing as well as provide adequate support personnel such as CNAs or ward clerks at all times regardless of patient census. This of course is a pipe dream. The fact of the matter is, nobody gives a damn! The best thing we can do at this point is to shut up and “do our jobs”. Until then, lets sit back, relax, and watch the healthcare industry meltdown. Fortunately for me, I’ve got front row seats! 🙂